


Promise?

by Rockingham



Series: The Space Between Us [2]
Category: Choices: High School Story: Class Act (Visual Novel)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/F, Graduation, Long-Distance Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-07
Updated: 2019-05-07
Packaged: 2020-02-27 12:41:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18739246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rockingham/pseuds/Rockingham
Summary: Bailey was sweating bullets.She had been thinking about this since Skye announced that she had been accepted to Carnegie Mellon University. All the way in Pennsylvania. At first Skye wasn’t going to go, but Bailey had convinced her to at least try. Carnegie was a great school and Bailey didn’t want to see Skye miss out on the opportunity because of her.The first time they talked about it, it was hard. They didn’t yell, they didn’t fight, but there was a tension in the air about what that meant for their relationship. Long distance wasn’t easy for a lot of people, but Bailey was more then willing to give it her all for Skye. She wanted Skye to know that. She wanted to ensure Skye that they can make it work.There was something Bailey wanted to do before Skye left. After graduation, she wanted to have a real talk with Skye about the future and what that could mean for them.As soon as Bailey stops in front of the familiar storefront she takes a breath.She hoped Skye liked it.





	Promise?

Bailey was sweating bullets.

She had been thinking about this since Skye announced that she had been accepted to Carnegie Mellon University. All the way in Pennsylvania. At first Skye wasn’t going to go, but Bailey had convinced her to at least try. Carnegie was a great school and Bailey didn’t want to see Skye miss out on the opportunity because of her.

The first time they talked about it, it was hard. They didn’t yell, they didn’t fight, but there was a tension in the air about what that meant for their relationship. Long distance wasn’t easy for a lot of people, but Bailey was more then willing to give it her all for Skye. She wanted Skye to know that. She wanted to ensure Skye that they can make it work.

There was something Bailey wanted to do before Skye left. After graduation, she wanted to have a real talk with Skye about the future and what that could mean for them.

As soon as Bailey stops in front of the familiar storefront she takes a breath.

She hoped Skye liked it.

_________________________

Graduation.

Bailey felt a mix of excitement and nervousness as she stood in line with Casey to enter the large event center where Berry was having the commencement ceremony. She was forced to break away from Skye after the teachers announced they were lining up in alphabetical order. The ceremony would start in a few minutes. Teachers ran around making sure everyone was in place.

“I can’t tell if I’m going to explode or throw up.” Casey said as the teachers settle down and the faint sound of the first cords of  _ The Land Of Hope And Glory _ start playing. The line starts moving and the twins share a look before they take a breath and follow the students in front of them.

The speakers take the stage one by one. Passing words of encouragement with smiles. Bailey glaces across the rows of students in front of her and Casey trying to spot a trace of Skye among the rest of their class. The Berry red caps and gowns make it a lot harder to spot the bright red hair that usually acted like a beacon. 

After the final speaker Principle Rivera takes the podium and announces that they will start handing out diplomas. Bailey watches the first few rows stand up and is able to catch Skye’s red hair in the third row. She smiles and waits patiently as the first couple students are called, walking across the stage and taking their diplomas. Casey hid a chuckle as the the B last names were called. He knew full well that Bailey intended to be the loudest person in the room, cheering as Skye walked across the stage. His laughing gets a little louder when the Principal starts going through C’s and Bailey starts shaking in excitement.

“ _ Skye Crandall _ ”

Before Bailey can let out her cheer, there’s loud cheering from the groups of parents watching the ceremony. The cheering is so loud that Skye visibly startles for a second. Bailey turns to see Rory and Mrs. Silva practically jumping up and down cheering as loudly as they could from their seats. Ajay and Erin sitting on either side of them clapping and cheering. Danielle and a few other of the older graduated theatre students were in the crowd clapping. Bailey smiles widely, happy to see everyone had made it to the ceremony as Ajay and some of the other students weren’t sure because of their college schedules and work. Bailey turns back to the stage, joining in the cheering, seeing Skye flush red a bit as she took her diploma and walked off stage.

“You guys don’t mess around.” Casey laughed as the rest of the Cs were called and they moved on.

They couldn’t help it, thing had gone south with Skye’s parents during Junior year after Brian went off to college. Her parents were fully prepared to toss Skye out the second she graduated. They had turned over her college account to her on her eighteenth birthday with a snide remark about wanting to see her make it on her own without their help past that. Her mom made comments that Skye would run back within a few months and how her parents weren’t going to help her if that happened.

Of course, that drove Skye to make sure she needed nothing from them after graduation. Within the first semester of junior year, Skye had taken up every job she could get to make sure her college account her parents handed over to her would be enough for her to survive for most of her college career, at least until she found something on campus to help supplement it. Repairing cell phone screens at the local tech shop and ghost-writing papers for whining Hearst students helped feed the account over the last two years of high school.

Mrs. Silva had been allowing Skye to start moving in to the guest room as Senior year started coming to a close. She had been aware of the situation and assured Skye that she would always be welcome there. Skye would be living with them over the summer until her flight to Pittsburgh. Bailey’s pretty sure Mrs. Silva is more excited about that then anyone else.

Bailey and Casey are directed to stand with the rest of their row and get in line to receive their diplomas as the Ks start being called. 

Bailey stands in front of her brother as the line slowly moves forward with each name called. Different volumes of cheering and clapping comes with each name. Pretty soon the boy in front of her walks across the stage. The bright lights and sea of burgundy caps fill her vision as Bailey takes a breath, reminding herself not to fall while walking across the stage.

“ _ Bailey Jenkins _ ” 

Bailey grins as Rory and Mrs. Silva lead another really loud cheer as she walks across the stage. She glances at the sea of caps and gowns to see a few people from the theatre club clapping as she walked across the stage. As she gets half-way across the stage, she’s handed a dark red fancy diploma holder and shakes hands with Principal Rivera.

“Congratulations.” Principal Rivera smiled and nodded her head at her as she shook her hand. 

“Thank you.” Bailey smiled back before turning to walk the rest of the way off the stage. She steps down the stairs and follows the line of students back to her seat.

“ _ Casey Jenkins. _ ”

Casey walks across the stage and gets the same loud cheering that Bailey had gotten. Bailey turns to watch him walk across stage with a grin on his face before she’s prompted by a teacher to keep like line moving. Bailey walks back to her seat and is joined by Casey a few moments later. The twins share a grin as the ceremony continues until all the graduates are told to stand up and toss their hats up into the air, cheering and clapping with the parents and friends in the audience.

The graduates are led out of the auditorium first, many of them break apart into their friend groups, laughing and cheering about what they were doing over the summer or about how excited they were for college.

Bailey breaks away from her brother when she notices Skye leaning on the wall on the other side of the room.

“SKYE!”

The other girl barely has time to look up from her phone before Bailey traps her in a tight hug. Skye laughs before wrapping an arm around Bailey, returning the hug.

“Hey dork.”

“Hey yourself nerd.” Bailey pulls away slightly, reangling herself to press a kiss against Skye’s lips, feeling the other girl smile into the kiss before pulling away.

“Bailey! Casey!” 

Bailey turns to see her parents rushing over. Her mother quickly pulls the twins into a group hug that their father immediately joins.

“We’re so proud of you.” Mr. Jenkins smiled brightly he notices Skye had moved off to the side and quickly tuts at her, “Don’t try to run away, Skye, come here.”

Their mother quickly leans back a little, reaching out and catching Skye by the arm, pulling her into the group hug as well. Skye oofs when she’s knocked into Bailey and wrapped into the tight group hug.

Bailey giggles, Skye was always a little awkward with her parents, even after almost four years of dating. Skye stiffens in the hug for a few seconds before relaxing and giving in to the embrace. 

“Bailey!”

“Skye!”

Bailey looks up and sees the rest of their theatre family walking over, Rory immediately runs forward and wraps an arm around Bailey and Skye. Erin is close behind her, smiling brightly and kissing Casey on the cheek as she walks up. Rory lets you and Skye go with a smile.

“Ajay, come hug everyone!” Rory motions for him to come over and he rolls his eyes before walking over and getting pulled into a group hug, Casey and Erin joining in for a few moments before everyone pulled away with smiles on their faces.

“Look at you three!” Mrs. Silva grins as she walks up, “All grown up and ready to head off into the world.”

“Not too soon.” Mrs. Jenkins quickly says as she smiles, “Let us enjoy the summer first before they head off to college.”

“Of course, I’m looking forward to spending time with my girls this summer.” Mrs. Silva announces as she wraps an arm around Skye and Rory’s shoulders. Bailey smiles as she watches Mrs. Silva fawn over Skye as if she was her own daughter. After a few pictures required by the parental units were taken the large group decides to head back to the Jenkins house for the graduation party, the group walks towards the parking lot together laughing. Bailey sneaks over and slips her hand into Skye’s as they walk.

_________________________

“Bailey dear, when do you start at UCLA?” Mrs. Silva asked back at the house. The party was pretty casual and the three graduates had changed out of their formal attire and gowns as soon as they got home.

“September 22 is the Freshman orientation.” Bailey said after a moment of thought.

“You start much later than Skye then,” Mrs. Silva takes a sip of her drink in thought, “She leaves in August doesn’t she?”   
“Her flight is August 20th. So she has a few days after she gets there to get used to the time change.” 

“How are you two doing with that?” Mrs. Silva askes with a concerned look on her face, “I understand it can be a little hard at first.”

“I think it’s harder for Skye then me honestly. She has to deal with her parents kicking her out on top of having to try to afford college by herself without her parents help past whatever was in her college fund.” Bailey explained. Even with Skye’s parents handing over the account to her, the account itself wasn’t large enough to fund much more then Skye’s education. That was only because Skye’s scholarships covered most of her tuition, if it weren’t for them Skye wouldn’t have been able to afford it.

Skye also had money stashed away for books and other expenses. 

“It’s added stress, but I think if you address the relationship side of things, it would put her mind at ease.” Mrs. Silva offers, “Long distance is hard, but it’s not impossible. Ed and I managed to do it for six years while he got his masters.”

“Any advice?”

“Learn each other's time zones. You kids are lucky and have smartphones now, add her time to your phone so you can be aware of what time it is for her before you call or text her. Make a schedule where you two can take time out of your week to talk to each other over the phone. Get to know each other’s schedules. Make sure she has something to remind her of you while she’s gone and you should have something to remind you of her. You know when me and Ed were just starting out he would send me the cutest hand-written letters.”

“You two are too cute.”

“Be creative about it, like Ed was with the letters. It’s old school but sometimes having something physically there that remind you of each other is worth so much more than just hearing their voice. Ed used to let me steal his shirts too.”

“Skye steals mine all the time.” Bailey laughed, “She sleeps in them when she’s here.”

“Do you steal things from her?” Mrs. Silva smiled knowingly as Bailey blushed.

“A sweater or two.”

“I know, I’ve seen you in them.” Mrs. Silva laughed. Bailey had grabbed one or two of Skye’s longer sweaters that fit her. They were soft and usually smelled like Skye. It was oddly comforting for her. “It also helps to talk about your relationship, you both need to talk about what you want and where this relationship is going so you both can be one the same page when she leaves.”

“I already thought about that.” Bailey announced as her hand went to the pocket of her jeans, the box that hadn’t left her side in two days tucked away. “I actually...got her something. But I’m really nervous.”

“I’m sure she’d like anything you got her.” Mrs. Silva assures, “But if you like I can take a look and tell you how much of a great girlfriend you are.”

Bailey smiles and looks over her shoulder a minute to ensure Skye was still deep in conversation with Ajay before slipping the box out of her pocket. Mrs. Silva’s eyes widen for a moment before Bailey pops open the box and shows her the contents.

Inside the box was a black ring with a silver heart engraved on it. Next to it was a white ring with a black heart engraved on it. They had cost Bailey over a month of tips from the restaurant to afford and she felt a little weird buying both instead of just buying Skye’s but they had come in a set and if she brought them together, the engraving was free. She had her own name engraved in Skye’s and Skye’s name engraved on her own.

“You’re very serious about her.” Mrs. Silva smiled as she looked up at Bailey.

“I felt kind weird about buying my own but they were a set and I thought they were perfect for us and I really wanted to surprise her with it.”

“Bailey, there are no rules on promise rings.” Mrs. Silva offered as she closed the box and passed it back to Bailey. “You two are going to be OK. I can feel it.”

_________________________

Bailey waits for the perfect time to steal Skye away. After a few hours the party starts to wind down and she sees her opening when she notices Skye looking for her.

“Hey,” Bailey grinned as she walked over, whispering as she took Skye’s hand, “Can I steal you for a minute?”

“Always.” Skye smiled and followed her as Bailey pulled her upstairs and to her room. She closed the door a majority of the way, making sure it was still cracked as it had become a rule whenever Skye was over, since Casey had the same rule for Erin it was only fair.

“I wanted to talk to you about something.” Bailey says as the two sit on the edge of the bed, “About Carnegie.”

Skye’s face falls and Bailey squeezes her hand.

“It’s not bad.” Bailey assures, “I wanted you to know that I want to work on the long distance thing and I have the full intention of staying together. We can find a way to make time every week to call and talk. We can plan Skype dates. We’ll have winter and summer breaks together and any other break that you can come back for. We can make this work. I know you’re worried about it, but I wanted you to know that I’m going to put in the effort for this. Because I love you, and I want to be with you.”

“I love you too.” Skye’s voice comes out quiet, almost in awe of Bailey’s speech, “I want this to work.”

“That’s why I wanted to give you something, to let you know how serious I am about this. Close your eyes.”

Skye gives her a skeptical look, but oblogies the demand and does as she’s told. Bailey fishes the box out of her pocket and opens it, taking out the black ring and takes Skye’s hand. She places the ring in Skye’s palm and closes her hand around it feeling herself shake as she holds Skye’s hand with both her own.

“I love you.” Bailey said as Skye blinks her eyes open and looks at Bailey with her head tilted in curiosity. “And I want to be with you. For as long as you’ll have me.”

Bailey moves her hands away and fidgets when Skye opens her hand and inspects the ring that was placed there. When she doesn’t say anything Bailey begins ranting nervously.

“I know it’s a little old school, but I really wanted to do something to show you that I’m really serious about us and I thought maybe promise rings would be a good show of that and I felt a little weird about picking them out myself but I really wanted to surprise you and-”

Bailey’s cut off when Skye leans forward, pressing a firm kiss to her lips, silencing her rant. Bailey takes a second to respond to the kiss, tilting her head as Skye leans closer to her, taking her left hand for a second before Bailey feels something being slipped onto her left ring finger.

“I love you.” Skye breaths into the air between them as she pulls away, leaving Bailey slightly dazed. Bailey looks at her hand to see her white ring placed on her ring finger while Skye’s black one on her own left hand, same finger.

“You know they don’t have to be worn like engagement rings right? I didn’t want you to be uncomfortable about wear it if-”

“Bailey.” Skye interupts her with a serious look. “This is how serious I am about us. The next time I put a ring on your finger it will be an engagement ring.”

Bailey stutters incoherently at the confident tone in Skye’s voice. 

“Y-You better, I did this proposal it’s your turn.”

Skye’s smile is almost dangerous, “You’ll never see it coming.”

“Wait what? Skye! You’re not supposed to scare people when proposing!”

Skye just laughs, flashing Bailey a beautiful smile, “I love you, you dork.”

Bailey snorts and pulls Skye toward her, pressing a firm kiss to her lips, “I love you too nerd.”


End file.
